adrift, thats the only way to describe where I am and have been for a while now. can anyone possibly be as directionless as I am? one day its stay in boston, another day travel, yet another go back to india and work for a corporate, another day its start my own thing, another day its don’t effing think, another architecture, another write that story, another dont effing think…sometimes i get the feeling that i was searching for something and i’ve reached midway and can no longer remember what it was

some have opined that there are amongst us those who don’t know what to do with their freedom. some are led and some follow. and some just watch and stay adrift?

anyway, the silver lining is that while we’re whiling 5 days/week away at work, hopefully the imagination is running wild with sweet thoughts of freedom: realistically, at least making plans for the 2 days away.  which is how one sometimes gets to do things which may not have been done, say if  i was a junkie, lol.

long story short, seen above was the highpoint of the weekend. my second time out kayaking, its an awesome shoulder & arm workout, besides obviously being fun. i would buy a kayak, except that would mean having to buy a car, too…not happening. i’ll stick with my local rent-a-kayak.

in the meantime, my train rides have been filled with the words of mr. dostoyevsky, first impressions: very detail oriented, few people know their friends as well as they get to know his characters…and since its so detail oriented, its slow reading, and regressive.  the title is “the idiot” and i have no idea where i got my hands on the book.

among other news: junkie sighting in boston

no maaan, don’t go by the image titles, you know i’m just playing, i love y’all, 420 rules, peace out, woooot!

my previous tryst with mr. hemingway was a self-appropriated copy of “a moveable feast” (courtesies: deepanjali chawla; the state bank of india (don’t ask)) which was an extremely fulfilling reading experience. which is what left me wondering how it could all go so awfully wrong in another book by the same author.

then it hit me like a 16-wheeler and i hadn’t even heard it moving… it all came together so beautifully, and in a flavor exclusively reserved for the  tragic. looking back it all made sense: why the author had indulged in detail and repetition -because these are the tools of familiarity; how he had involved me in the life and happiness of the protagonists; where the familiarity had a depth to it that became my curse in the end – brilliant writing; what the stranger on the train had meant when he said it was the most devastating book he’d ever read, while i looked at him cynically – now i couldn’t agree more; how i’d written a post about how this book was becoming a drag…all the pieces were suddenly drawn together and i could see how perfectly the pieces fit together.

mr. hemingway had the gift of being able to showcase how life can be a walk in the park, the gut to demonstrate how it often comes right back and bites you in the ass when you least expect it, and the gall to leave the reader with nothing. in case you haven’t understood the gist of all this banter….go buy the book, read it and don’t part with it (i almost gave it away on the train when i was halfway through!!)

P.S. if i were ever to be reminded of how I’d compared this book with R.K. Narayan’s Man-eaters of Malgudi, I will (metaphorically, of course) turn a deep shade of scarlet. and then, hopefully, i will see how great it feels to be wrong about some things.

but come, let us not stray…though this ain’t no bond flick, its made for bollywood… there will be suspense and drama, dark alleys and special effects, animated sounds and long dialogue, song and dance around trees, hell there has to be a romantic angle with the spinster spy in the movie falling in love with some douche who’s perpetually in a nightsuit**(but works for the bad guys)!! though they may have to cast someone slightly more spy—ish and not some aunty who looks like she’s most at home in a sabzi mandi.

and then, of course, there’s the question of the ending…no small challenge for any director…since the movie has to have a happy ending….or, he could chicken out and end on a patriotic note, but who’s going to pay to watch that movie, eh? (oh…me, i’m a patriotic sucker <insert cheesy link>!!)

* i’m so politically correct (and awesome)

** read pathan

this is how it actually will be, probably

what’s important is to get the show back on the road!!

while reading, one tends to get involved in the small town interpersonal politics of malgudi, though it seems a little silly to begin with. however, as the author builds on the most common of middle-class Indian’s symapthies and prejudices, one does get more involved in the events, and then the book becomes rather hard to put down. overall, it seems the authors objective was not as much to provoke thought than to mildly entertain while narrating a story garnished with flowery descriptions, small-town humor and a small dose of suspense. all in all, a reasonable lazy sunday read. 

P.S. in my case, having known someone a lot like the man-eater, albeit a slightly milder version, I’m sure I  read substantially more into the humor than author would’ve intended. our man-eater, though, has numerous vices, which, in retrospect, may just be a good thing for his acquaintances.

and the formatting is screwed too.

Anyhow, what I started off wanting to write about was placelessness, a momentary (or not) lack of awareness of one’s immediate surroundings. I guess that could only happen to someone who was so used to a place that even when miles away from it, the person was still thinking as if they were there. Like the other evening, I was ready to get out of work with the intention of getting kebabs…from where? Nizammudin, of course. I’m in Boston. And I assure you that I haven’t lost my mind. A bit of my memory perhaps, but not the good stuff. That I remember. Vividly.

Like the slow-moving blonde in the room where a cold wind blew in the windows bringing the sound of distant windchimes and the smell of autumn; …the field bathed in moonlight in a valley in Ladakh, drinking cheap whiskey with no lights for miles and billions of stars in the sky, listening to a friend sing songs in a language I know nothing of; … Stars, that hallucinogenic train journey, the first time I ever vacationed alone, returning to lie restfully in my side berth, with millions of stars in my window feeling like blazing needles coming to get me… Arriving at goa at 3 in the cold morning, finding warmth, and how!… These are things I refuse to forget.

So, another one of my pet peeves…NRIndian kids…another annoying lot, that just doesnt get it. no, not Mr. Peters himself, who ive seen only on stage, and ootube, and not in person. though it could be that he’s equally annoying face-to-face, i highly doubt it…he doesnt seem to have the identity crisis that some in his audience seemed to have.

Just got back from a show part of his “greencard tour”, and the man outdid his reputation for audacity and in-your-face hilarity. I feel bad for mr. chimanrao, akhmit and natasha, his pick among the indians for the night. they will not be getting over the embarrasment soon. what got my goat however, were the 2 NRI kids (they were in their early 20′s, so I guess that makes me a dinosaur) who happened to be sitting in staggered rows diagonally across from each other, with my friend and I in the middle. since my friend decided to take a 50 dollar nap, i was left at the mercy of these twats everytime they got what mr. peters had been referring to. this was not as often as it could have been, and i thanked my stars they were not the sharpest tools in the shed. the times they did get something, they exchanged soulja boy handshakes  right in front of my face. they were tools alright and back in the day sumbudy wouldve got hurt real baad. Not today, I watched them repeatedly do their thing in the foreground, hoot “oye russulll”, “ya indiaaaa”, leaned back in my chair, sipped on my beer and marvelled at the 39 year old man on stage doing what he does best. Twas a good night.